“Why haven’t I worked through all these issues? Why am I still not healed?”

Most of us who are survivors ask ourselves these questions many times. “I’ve been on this journey for five years. When does it end?”

They are the questions we ask on our worst days.

On our better days, we examine our lives and remember where we started. In those self-reflective times, we admit we’ve come a long way. A friend said to me, “In those depressing times when you tell yourself that you ought to be farther down the road, you’re probably more healthy than you know.”

Maybe he is correct, but it doesn’t stop us from asking the questions. “Why not? Why not?”

For myself, I can say this. I keep discovering the insidious consequences of my sexual abuse. It’s a good thing I didn’t recognize all the effects in the beginning, or they would most likely have overwhelmed and immobilized me. In my darkest moments, it seems as if the healing takes place one day at a time, or perhaps even slower—one small step a year.

I’ve jokingly said, “If I’d known in the beginning that this would be such a hard, painful journey, I probably wouldn’t have started.”

In my early days of grappling with the issue, I felt that way because the feelings were too intense and too brutal. But now I say, “I’m glad I struggled and fought. My healing journey has been worth re-experiencing the pain that comes with it. I’ve learned more about myself. I’ve not only accepted who I am, but I honestly like the person inside me.”

Here’s something I say to myself regularly, I am not quite healed; I am a healing-in-progress.

- Cecil Murphey

Cecil Murphey has written two books on sexual abuse. The first was When a Man You Love Was Abused and Not Quite Healed. He is the author or co-author of several best-selling books including 90 Minutes in Heaven, which was on The New York Times’ best-seller list for five years and Gifted Hands: the Ben Carson Story. www.menshatteringthesilence.blogspot.com

The mission of 1in6 is to help men who have had unwanted or abusive sexual experiences in childhood live healthier, happier lives.

1in6′s mission also includes serving family members, friends, and partners by providing information and support resources on the web and in the community.

Joyful Heart and 1in6 invite you to visit 1in6.org for info, options and hope, and to learn more about our partnership and Engaging Men initiative at men.joyfulheartfoundation.org.

The views expressed above are not necessarily those of the Joyful Heart Foundation or 1in6.

I am currently 27 years old; I’ve been married for 3 years and have been in steady career for 5 years. It has been almost a decade since my childhood abuses came to the light and were thoroughly dealt with. When I began seeing a counselor about it, I remember him sharing with me that he too was a survivor, and although he had felt like he had processed through his own experience in a healthy and thorough way, there were still days were the feelings of shame and insecurity would return.

I have experienced this many times since my ordeal however, the frequency and intensity of these events has decreased over time. It seems that these recurrences cannot be avoided and, for some, may in fact be a healthy component necessary for complete healing. Although they are very unpleasant when they occur they can allow us an opportunity grow stronger, to choose to apply the truths we have come to know in place of the lies that we have previously believed.

For me, my greatest and continual source of strength has come from my relationship with my heavenly Father. His words spoken to me through scripture and through my times alone with him are the only reason I am doing as well as I am today.

Some time ago I had a dream that has given me a great visual to help me fight the feelings of shame when they try to return and consume me. In this dream I was full of shame and was thrown into the back of a van. I was put into a straight jacket and the other men in the van were mocking me and hurling shameful insults at me. I was terrified because I knew how terrifying and horrible the place was that they were taking me. Suddenly I knew how to escape: I began to speak out loud the words of God found in the Bible. As I spoke the other men in the van became terrified of me and covered their ears as the straight jacket began to come apart and fall away from my body. I felt exhilarated and I was free!

When I feel the shame return I visualize this dream and say out loud something to the effect of, “No, I refuse to put on the straight jacket of shame. I am free and shame has no place in my life. Thank you Lord for your goodness and your kindness and that you have freed me and healed me from shame because there is no condemnation in Christ and I am His!” Sometimes I declare this several times a day until the shame succumbs to the truth. It takes perseverance but its a battle worth fighting and a battle that we must learn to win if we are going to live the rest of our lives as healthy men who are not enslaved to our past wounds.

- By Aaron Kesseler 

Survivors experience varied effects of trauma. Some experience intrusive thoughts. Healthy coping mechanisms are just as varied and can only be determined on an individual basis. The power to choose which healthy coping skill one uses can be a vital part of healing. Some choose faith and spirituality. We heal in our own time, and at our own pace.

Aaron Kesseler was born in 1986, married the love of his life in 2010 and is currently working for his step-father’s commercial heating business in Seattle, WA. After high school he attended Northwest University in Kirkland for two years. Aaron has volunteered as a camp counselor for five years with the Muscular Dystrophy Association Summer Camp as well as three years with Royal Family Kids Camp, a summer camp for the most abused and neglected children in the area.

The mission of 1in6 is to help men who have had unwanted or abusive sexual experiences in childhood live healthier, happier lives.

1in6′s mission also includes serving family members, friends and partners by providing information and support resources on the web and in the community.

Joyful Heart and 1in6 invite you to visit 1in6.org for info, options and hope, and to learn more about our partnership and Engaging Men initiative at men.joyfulheartfoundation.org.

The views expressed above are not necessarily those of the Joyful Heart Foundation or 1in6.

I spoke recently with a group of college men whose fraternity had been sanctioned for sexually offensive attitudes and behavior. Our discussion was part of a mandated remedy. Not surprisingly, mandated conversations often don’t lead immediately to open dialogue.

Efforts to educate men about sexual violence generally cast them in one of two roles: bystanders, either preventing or supporting sexually aggressive behavior, speech or attitudes; or as perpetrators of violence.

This time, we experimented with introducing a third role to our conversation: the reality that men are also frequently the victims of violence, including the one in six men, who have had unwanted or abusive sexual experiences in childhood.

Make no mistake. Trauma can never be an excuse for hurting others. But I’ve found that acknowledging men’s experiences of trauma can lead to startling insights about violence. And by the end of the session, these men were readily identifying ways that men’s socialized behaviors can cause real harm.

Instead of focusing directly on their offensive actions, we first discussed childhood trauma, its impact on men and boys and how to support other men’s efforts to cope with those impacts in healthy ways.

We started by looking at a study of 17,000 patients of the Kaiser Permanente Health plan in San Diego, the Adverse Childhood Experience (ACE) study. Researchers found that childhood trauma is actually a norm for men—almost two-thirds (62%) of the men in the study had had at least one of ten pre-identified traumatic experiences in their childhood.

Half of those had experienced more than one of the ten.

In a culture where boys grow up thinking that “real men” are never victimized, this is big news!

These traumas—what they refer  to as “ACEs”  (Adverse Childhood Experiences)—include physical, sexual or emotional abuse or neglect, domestic violence, or substance abuse in their household, parental separation or divorce, and a parent with a history of mental illness or incarceration. (Obviously, someone might have had other kinds of childhood trauma as well, but these were the ones considered in the study.)

Even more importantly, the researchers discovered that the more of these childhood traumas a person has, the higher their risk for a host of negative physical, mental health and behavioral outcomes—things like heart and liver disease, substance abuse, smoking, sexually transmitted diseases and depression.

For instance, people with 5 or more ACEs were 7 to 10 times more likely to be addicted to drugs, than people with no ACEs. Having ACEs in any category increased the risk of attempted suicide by 2 to 5 times.

Both men and women who were sexually abused in childhood, were:

• more than twice as likely to have attempted suicide
• 40% more likely to marry an alcoholic
• 40% to 50% more likely to have current problems with their marriage.

Once we’d normalized the idea that most men (including those fraternity members in the room) have some kind of childhood trauma history, we brainstormed various situations and social interactions that might trigger a man’s traumatic memories and the reactive feelings that might be stirred up. They mentioned triggers like uninvited physical touch, even done in jest; the emotional risks inherent in the dynamics of dating; parties where alcohol was present; feelings of losing control; situations where they felt humiliation or shame.

Then we explored some common coping strategies that men have been raised to use to numb or defend against those feelings and to avoid feeling vulnerable—things like drug and alcohol abuse; sexual compulsivity; developing a tough, domineering or controlling image; expressing disdain for another’s vulnerability; violence against others or themselves. Ironically, they found themselves discussing, without defensiveness, the very behaviors that had resulted in their sanction.

We finished by discussing the idea that, we men, all have a responsibility to encourage one another to  be our best selves—supportively challenging other men when their behaviors undermine their integrity or well-being. We discovered that focusing on healthier ways of dealing with childhood trauma can also change the way men view masculine norms and the often self-destructive coping strategies we learn as boys.

“This is different,” one man noted. “We’re talking about ourselves.”

- By Peter Pollard

Peter Pollard is the Training and Outreach Director for 1in6, Inc. Peter previously worked for 15 years as a state, child-protection social worker and was the Public Education director at Stop It Now! Since 2003, he has served as the Western Massachusetts coordinator for SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests) and also does work for a Certified Batterers Intervention Program.

The mission of 1in6 is to help men who have had unwanted or abusive sexual experiences in childhood live healthier, happier lives.

1in6′s mission also includes serving family members, friends and partners by providing information and support resources on the web and in the community.

Joyful Heart and 1in6 invite you to visit 1in6.org for info, options and hope, and to learn more about our partnership and Engaging Men initiative at men.joyfulheartfoundation.org.

The views expressed above are not necessarily those of the Joyful Heart Foundation or 1in6.

Two weeks ago, Joyful Heart staff, board members and supporters gathered to celebrate the Joyful Revolution at our 2013 annual gala. This year’s theme was YES RISK JOY.

These words were borrowed from a poem by Louise Glück called snowdrops, and this theme echoed throughout Cipriani 42^nd Street that night—from the beautiful installation at the entrance of the space that brought written word to life, to the moving story of our work, told by the evening’s host, Peter Hermann.

[Show as slideshow]

12►

We were joined by members of our Board of Directors, the many individuals and corporations who made the evening—and our work—possible, and the many celebrities and public figures who shared their voices and generous spirits with us including: Mario Batali, Richard Belzer, Mary J. Blige, Andre Braugher, Will Chase, Glenn Close, Harry Connick Jr., Raul, Esparza, Joely Fisher, Dann Florek, Kelli Giddish, Megan Hilty, Julianne Hough, Chris Meloni, Debra Messing, Hugh Jackman, Jemima Kirke, Ingrid Michaelson, Mary-Louise Parker, Danny Pino, Samantha Ronson, George Stephanopolus, Uma Thurman, and Ali Wentworth.

[Show as slideshow]

Peter Hermann, the evening's host, stands in front of the Spirit of Stony Brook Marching Band. Photography by: Michael Webber

The program began as the Spirit of Stony Brook marching band called us to attention. As their horns blasted, guests found their way to their seats and Peter began the evening’s program, introducing Joyful Heart, our work and why we were gathered together.

As you likely know, the mission of the Joyful Heart Foundation is to heal, educate and empower survivors of sexual assault, domestic violence and child abuse, and to shed light into the darkness that surrounds these issues. For years now, we’ve called our annual New York City gala our Joyful Revolution, and it’s made possible by a community that comes together to say NO MORE to these crimes, that believes in the experiences of survivors and more than that—in their courage, their wholeness, their perseverance, grit and determination.

More than the theme of our gala, the words YES RISK JOY sum up the spirit of why and how Joyful Heart came to be and the journey that survivors are brave enough to persevere through. Something in them says YES, allows them the take the RISK of stepping out of a kind of darkness and urges them to lay claim, once again of perhaps for the first time, to JOY.

After Peter kicked things off, he introduced Maile Zambuto, Chief Executive Officer. As Maile said of a survivor’s journey:

“YES is the beginning.

JOY is the hard-won, precious prize at the end.

And everything in between is RISK. The risk of feeling again, beginning again, letting go, entertaining the possibility of maybe attempting to trust again.”

Mariska Hargitay, Joyful Heart’s Founder & President, then joined her on stage to introduce this year’s Heart of Gold Award recipient, Joyful Heart board member, Sukey Novogratz:

“I had started on SVU and I was getting all these letters from people who were disclosing to me, and then I learned the statistics, and I thought, ‘My God, I have to do something.’ And Joyful Heart was my answer. I just felt people needed a place to heal, a place that would connect them to that fighter within them that said, ‘I want to live.’

“I feel like we’ve sort of been divinely guided since then, like the right people came at the right time to help us grow into who we are today. Among those people divinely orchestrated to cross our path is one person in particular, Sukey Novogratz.”

Few people could embody the spirit of YES RISK JOY—and of Joyful Heart—more than Sukey. Through her incredible generosity, Sukey has made many of our signature programs possible. Because of her, we have not only been able to do what is necessary, but we’ve been able to ask what’s possible, to imagine, to broaden our vision and expand our horizon.

Sukey stands in front of the art installation featuring the words of our night—YES RISK JOY—inspired by her. Photography by Michael Webber

But it’s not just Sukey’s game-changing generosity we honored. It was also her incredible courage, her spirit, her joy and her light.

At 17—a singer, dancer and all-around self-professed “musical geek”—Sukey went off to Harvard for a summer theater program before her first year of college. “I was marinated in song,” Sukey describes of her 17-year-old self. “There wasn’t a musical I couldn’t sing my way into.”

One night after rehearsal and a game of quarters among acquaintances from her dorm, three 17-year-old boys brutally raped her, leaving her for dead next to the river. That night, everything changed. The music stopped.

“I went from an eager and excited 17-year-old girl at the very beginning of her adult life to a shell of a human being smashed to bits and pieces. And it took me 28 years to build myself back up again.”

But she has built herself back up. And it wasn’t easy. Sukey knows—all too well—what it means to say YES, RISK and search for JOY.

“After many years being out on the look-out-post of my life searching for signs to connect the dots, I have come to see the beautiful constellation of living. And I am here to report that it is magnificent. Today I choose to see the magic that surrounds me…I live in grace, in poetry, in magic that is my song. And it’s all going to be more than ok.”

As Sukey finished her remarks, she moved to a mic at center stage and began singing, a cappella, the first verses of “Be OK” by Ingrid Michaelson, only to be joined moments later by Ingrid herself, and then a chorus of the 500 joyful revolutionaries in attendance who sang along with her.

For sharing her light—and her song—with Joyful Heart, we are ever grateful to and utterly in awe of Sukey. In fact, as Mariska said, “I don’t even know what to say. So I’m actually going to leave that to someone else…a very special someone else.” With that, the one and only Mary J. Blige took to the stage to celebrate Sukey with a song just for her. If we weren’t already speechless, we were by the time Mary was finished.

As the applause died down, Mariska came back to the stage to introduce Lydia Fenet of Christie’s to lead the auction portion of the evening. Lydia got hands in the air and our jaws on the floor, raising more than $400,000 for incredible experiential packages, from a private island getaway to meals, golf and personal styling lessons with the stars. And all these incredible packages were donated so that the money raised can directly support our mission. After the experiential auction, the programmatic auction began, during which guests could raise their paddles to support Joyful Heart’s programs in any amount.

For our first lot, our Healing & Wellness work, we heard from Heather Gunn-Rivera, creator of the Sandy Hook Healing Project, about Joyful Heart’s response to the tragedy in Newtown, Connecticut. Guided by her vision and light, Joyful Heart helped bring vital resources to Newtown in the wake of the shooting, helping to provide clinical and therapeutic services and logistical coordination of over 200 volunteers who donated more than 1,000 hours to serve over 300 teachers, parents, children and first responders. And that is but one corner of our Healing & Wellness work to help the frontline response to trauma. Our Heal the Healers serves an average of 128 organizations and communities and 2,500 individuals each year.

Next, Peter and Lydia then introduced the second programmatic lot: our Education & Awareness around NO MORE. NO MORE represents the first time the domestic violence and sexual assault movements have come together, unified under a common symbol and one goal: to end domestic violence and sexual assault. As part of this movement, Joyful Heart has produced a series of PSAs starring some of the most recognizable faces in entertainment to deliver the message of NO MORE silence, NO MORE excuses, NO MORE violence. And this fall, we’ll be bringing it everywhere—to your TV, to billboards, in magazines and online. The vast majority of this campaign—a $2.6 million effort—has been donated. As Peter said, “we know this campaign will be undeniable in its power and impossible to ignore.”

For the third lot, we welcomed Audrey Polk to the stage. A sister and a mother, she is also a survivor of rape. One night in 1997, Audrey awoke to a stranger raping her while children laid frozen in the bed next to her. She went through a rape kit exam and reported her rape to the police. She said, “I called the police over and over to find out who did this to me, and they had nothing to say. So I stopped calling.” Her rape kit would languish in Detroit’s backlog of 11,000 untested kits for 14 years, until her kit was finally tested and her rapist sent to prison for the next 30 to 50 years. This is the power of rape kit testing. And it’s the goal of our Policy & Advocacy team to get every single rape kit off police and crime lab shelves. As part of this, we are conducting critical research on how jurisdictions across the country notify victims of the status of their cases and their rape kits. We will use this research and release it to agencies around the country to end the backlog with reforms that are just, compassionate and survivor-centered.

And finally, we asked our community to dig just a little deeper, to help to actually test these rape kits by donating to the Detroit Crime Commission’s Rape Kit Backlog Initiative. Every dollar donated will be used to meet the $12.5 million need to get each and every rape kit off the shelves and into the labs. Testing works: already, as a result of testing only 400 of Detroit’s backlog of 11,000 kits, 30 potential serial rapists have been identified. If you would like to make your donation, click here.

At the end of the evening, we had raised over $2,000,000, the most we’ve ever raised at this event, or any event. It speaks volumes: it speak to the work I am so proud each and every day to be a part of, and it speaks to the immense generosity of our community—a community that recognizes just how high the stakes are.

[Show as slideshow]

12►

We spoke at the gala about our response to the crimes of sexual assault, domestic violence and child abuse, and to the need—one of the most pressing of our time—to change the way things are. Since our founding, we’ve responded to the survivors of these crimes, changing the idea of healing from more than surviving, but thriving and living a life full of joy. We’ve answered calls to prove that this approach to healing works. (It does.) We’ve responded to the frontline workers who find themselves to be profoundly affected by the suffering they bear witness to everyday. We helped shine a light on the rape kit backlog—a breach of justice so large that we still don’t know for sure how many hundreds of thousands of other survivors stopped calling their police departments.

Kafka said, “By believing passionately in something that still does not exist, we create it.”

The Joyful Revolution is about creating a community that fundamentally changes the way we respond to these crimes so that someday, there isn’t a need for a response at all. You are that community.

Sukey said it in her speech: change is hard. But you embrace it. You join us at a place where YES flows into RISK and meets JOY. You do what is difficult in search of what is possible—a day when sexual assault, domestic violence and child abuse are NO MORE. And you invite—you challenge—others to join us to make it real.

My dream for this event for years from now—I don’t know when—is to simply be referred to as the Joyful Way It Is. No need for a revolution, for creating something that does not yet exist. Joy, respect, a society that has said NO MORE violence and abuse…it will be the way it is. And it will be joyful indeed.

Thank you for bringing us closer to that day.

I “forgot” about my abuse. I didn’t remember anything about my childhood before I was 11 or 12 years old. Forgetting, a form of denial, is a common coping mechanism. Looking back, the clues were there, but I didn’t know. Several times a month a dream recurred. In it, I walked through our home where I had lived until we moved when I was 15 years old. When someone unexpectedly touched me from behind, I jumped. In a movie, a sinister figure chased a boy in the dark and I cringed in fear.

One day, as a middle-aged adult finishing a 12-mile run, a memory flashed through my brain. Tears flowed and the first painful linking of my past forced itself on me. Then I knew: I had been sexually molested. Over the next months, other incidents seeped into my consciousness.

I kept trying to convince myself that the abuse hadn’t happened. About that time, the false-memory syndrome became national news. Apparently, a few therapists had inadvertently planted false memories in their clients. I hadn’t gone to a therapist, but I wanted mine to be false memories.

But they were real.

I’m an imaginative person and, despite the inner turmoil, I tried to banish those experiences as self-inventions. “They’re not true,” I cried. “I’ve made them up.”

But they were real.

Once I faced the truth about my tormented childhood—and for months it was a struggle—the healing process began.

“They were real,” I said to myself repeatedly. “They happened.”

Those two simple, oft-repeated sentences opened the door into my long-hidden pathway of denial. Later, my three sisters corroborated my memories, even though they weren’t aware of the abuse.

Now I know. They were real.

Yes, I was molested. Those things happened. Because I accept that fact, I am overcoming the pain.

- By Cecil Murphey

Cecil Murphey has written two books on sexual abuse. The first was When a Man You Love Was Abused and Not Quite Healed. He is the author or co-author of several best-selling books including 90 Minutes in Heaven, which was on The New York Times’ best-seller list for five years and Gifted Hands: the Ben Carson Story. www.menshatteringthesilence.blogspot.com

The mission of 1in6 is to help men who have had unwanted or abusive sexual experiences in childhood live healthier, happier lives.

1in6′s mission also includes serving family members, friends and partners by providing information and support resources on the web and in the community.

Joyful Heart and 1in6 invite you to visit 1in6.org for info, options and hope, and to learn more about our partnership and Engaging Men initiative at men.joyfulheartfoundation.org.

The views expressed above are not necessarily those of the Joyful Heart Foundation or 1in6.

Everything she says about vulnerability and shame can be directly applied to survivors of child sex abuse. As a researcher, she states that it is a scientific fact that connection is the basis for human life and shame unravels connection. That spells problems for us survivors, because our most powerful emotion is shame. She goes on to say that shame makes us feel as though we are not worthy of connection.

Welcome to my world and that of many survivors who are working through a healing process. At times, we can feel unworthy—unworthy of love; unworthy of joy; unworthy of the good things in life. My life looked more like a battlefield than a playground or a park. My perceived strength was really coming from fear, because there was no way I was going to let anyone ever get the upper hand on me again. Show no vulnerability and give no quarter.

Ms. Brown tells us that vulnerability is not weakness, but is in fact strength. It is through the strength to risk vulnerability that we find connection, growth and joy. What that says to me is that I have watched life from behind my protective walls and lived closed off from the beauty that is all around, yet never touched it. That is no doubt why people commented on how serious I always seemed to be. By cutting off my pain I also cut off the good feelings in life.

I began my healing by telling my story to a therapist. In hindsight I realize that took real courage. I began shedding my shame a piece at a time. Once the walls built by my shame started coming down, I began feeling lots of emotions. In letting go of my fear, I found courage to tell my story and risk being imperfect (vulnerable) in the world. I have lived a linear life, only deviating from the line to go around obstacles. My life now is circular. I find amazing connections that come around when they are needed. Life can be so much more than a race downfield. When we are strong enough to be vulnerable we find that everything is connected and in living those connections is a life of truth, worth and joy.  And yes, it includes tears and pain as well, but it is good just to feel after living numb for so long.

My wife and I got a wedding present a million years ago and it was a ceramic turtle with a small tag on it that said “Behold the turtle, he makes progress only when he sticks his neck out.” May you find the strength to risk being vulnerable, tell your story, and in doing so find yourself, and all life has to offer.

Speaker, author and advocate for victims of child sexual abuse Randy Ellison, himself a victim as a teen, says he works on the issue because “we can’t stop the cycle of abuse unless it is not just acknowledged, but talked about, understood and prevented.” Author of the book Boys Don’t Tell: Ending the Silence of Abuse, Ellison is a child sexual abuse victim’s advocate and an activist promoting cultural change on this issue working with local, state and national organizations addressing abuse prevention and awareness.

Ellison is a founding member and former board president of Oregon Abuse Advocates and Survivors in Service, OAASIS. Working with OAASIS he has helped pass groundbreaking legislation in Oregon on child sex abuse. He is also a member of the Oregon Attorney General’s Sexual Assault Task Force.

1in6′s mission also includes serving family members, friends, and partners by providing information and support resources on the web and in the community.

Joyful Heart and 1in6 invite you to visit 1in6.org for info, options and hope, and to learn more about our partnership and Engaging Men initiative at men.joyfulheartfoundation.org.

The views expressed above are not necessarily those of the Joyful Heart Foundation or 1in6.

The Joyful Heart Foundation and 1in6 graciously provided me with a venue this past year in which I was able to share my voice on behalf of the voiceless – the male survivors of childhood sexual abuse whose voices are silenced with threats of violence, the survivors whose screams are muted by the “man box” and the victims who are too afraid to speak. As one of this blog’s voices, I want to leave you in my final blog post with a message of both hope and challenge.

Looking at the 1in6 website traffic in 2012, there was a 57% increase in visitors from the previous year. This increase gives us hope that healing is possible. Unfortunately, it also highlights the fact that our efforts to support male survivors of childhood sexual abuse must continue as there are still a large number of men who continue to suffer in silence.

We must no longer allow the plight of male survivors of childhood sexual abuse to fall on deaf ears. We must hear their cries, however faint they may be, and raise them up to full volume in order to improve our communities. We can no longer remain silent while our partners, brothers, uncles, neighbors, co-workers and classmates endure the pain of childhood sexual abuse. By remaining silent, we hinder their journey towards healing.

Mahatma Gandhi once said, “Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it.” We must all take some sort of action, big or small, because we all have a stake in the outcome, and as a fellow reader of this blog, it is the perfect time to forge ahead with a plan of action.

Institutions, like city governments, universities and local churches must lead their constituents, students and followers down a path of non-violence by focusing on prevention rather than merely responding to sexual abuse after the fact, and individuals must hold them accountable by speaking out, demonstrating, calling or writing letters to the editor about the issue of male childhood sexual abuse.

Each of us is a piece of the puzzle. How we come together determines what the picture will look like. I urge you to rise to the challenge and to do your part. As insignificant as you think it might be, it is still more than what was being done yesterday and combined with the efforts of others, it can power the change we seek in order to create a picture of a community that we can all be proud of – a community of healing for male survivors of sexual abuse.

- By Emiliano Diaz de Leon

Emiliano C. Diaz de Leon is a Cultural Capacity Specialist for 1in6. Besides his work with 1in6, Emiliano has more than a decade of experience working for multiple domestic and sexual violence centers in Texas.  Since 2008, Emiliano has worked as a Primary Prevention Specialist for the Texas Association Against Sexual Assault (TAASA) and since October 2011 providing technical assistance to the Office on Violence Against Women (OVW) Engaging Men Program grantees around the country as a Men’s Engagement Specialist. The mission of 1in6 is to help men who have had unwanted or abusive sexual experiences in childhood live healthier, happier lives.

1in6′s mission also includes serving family members, friends, and partners by providing information and support resources on the web and in the community.

Joyful Heart and 1in6 invite you to visit 1in6.org for info, options and hope, and to learn more about our partnership and Engaging Men initiative at men.joyfulheartfoundation.org.

The views expressed above are not necessarily those of the Joyful Heart Foundation or 1in6.

Just in time for Mother’s Day, Bloomingdale’s has teamed up with Joyful Heart to join us in saying NO MORE—our collective movement centered around the simple message that together we can end domestic violence and sexual assault. Available both in stores and online during the month of May, 10% from each sale of Bloomingdale’s exclusive Aqua charm bracelet and heart pendant will be donated to Joyful Heart in honor of Mother’s Day.

Plus, Mariska Hargitay and Bloomingdale’s have the ultimate gift for Law & Order: Special Victims Unit fans—tickets to an exclusive luncheon with Mariska in June at Bloomingdale’s famed Le Train Bleu Restaurant. The first 20 people to email bloomingdales@joyfulheartfoundation.org at 12 pm EST on Friday, May 3, 2013 with a bid of $1,500 will receive two tickets to this once-in-a-lifetime luncheon where 100% of the proceeds benefit Joyful Heart.

Our Heartshop’s additional gifts that give back include a selection of special items to help you find the perfect memento to say thank you.

Michael Stars

By popular demand, Michael Stars has created a brand new Joyful Heart tee, which features the empowering words “Joy,” “Heal” and “Heart” on the back of an ultra-soft supima cotton short sleeve tee. This relaxed fit top is available in both navy and grey with 25% of each sale benefiting Joyful Heart. $68

Me&Ro

Me&Ro’s Fearlessness Tag Pendant brings a graceful twist and a smaller size the classic dog tag design. It is engraved with the word “Fearlessness” to remind us that embracing fearlessness inspires one to approach life with an open heart and to be strong in the face of life’s adversities. The tag pendant is available with a silver or gold slate on chain or with a silver slate on cotton cord and 100% of net proceeds benefit Joyful Heart. $130 – $1,030

Tiny Pine Press

A handwritten note is always a cherished way to express your appreciation and thoughts. Gratitude Cards from Tiny Pine Press are beautifully crafted with a delicate Swarovski crystal on the front and 100% of proceeds are donated to Joyful Heart. $24

Fran’s Chocolates

Fran’s Chocolates’ “Box of Joy” is the perfect gift for those with a sweet tooth. This delicious assortment of Gray Salt Caramels in dark chocolate, Smoked Salt Caramels in milk chocolate and Dark Chocolate Hearts is wrapped in a beautiful brown linen box and 50% of net proceeds are donated to Joyful Heart. $50

You can also make a contribution to Joyful Heart in honor of that special person as a way to express gratitude from the bottom of your joyful heart.

Statistics show that 95% of abusers were they themselves abused as children. When we are ready and when we are strong enough we may allow ourselves to move into the emotional realm of empathy. The odds are that your abuser suffered the exact same pain that they inflicted on you. If you can, think about that person as a little boy or girl and how scared they were when it happened to them. Imagine the shame that they lived with all of their lives not knowing how to deal with what happened to them and too ashamed to tell anyone. Then, after many years of that unrevealed secret festering inside of them like an infected appendix they exploded and they acted out inflicting that same pain on someone else, forever putting their life on a terrible course.

This reality by no means justifies our abusers and is not supposed to. By realizing that they suffered the same things we did it helps us to be able to forgive them. Forgiveness, contrary to common belief has much more to do with your healing than with the other person.

- By Aaron Kesseler 

Aaron  Kesseler was born in 1986, married the love of his life in 2010 and is currently working for his step-father’s commercial heating business in Seattle, WA. After high school he attended Northwest University in Kirkland for two years. Aaron has volunteered as a camp counselor for five years with the Muscular Dystrophy Association Summer Camp as well as three years with Royal Family Kids Camp, a summer camp for the most abused and neglected children in the area.

The mission of 1in6 is to help men who have had unwanted or abusive sexual experiences in childhood live healthier, happier lives.

1in6′s mission also includes serving family members, friends and partners by providing information and support resources on the web and in the community.

Joyful Heart and 1in6 invite you to visit 1in6.org for info, options and hope, and to learn more about our partnership and Engaging Men initiative at men.joyfulheartfoundation.org.

The views expressed above are not necessarily those of the Joyful Heart Foundation or 1in6.

“I didn’t know it was a rape. I don’t know what rape looks like.”

This is the comment from a 16-year-old high school boy who witnessed the sexual assault of a female student in Steubenville, Ohio when asked why he didn’t do something to stop it. This comment has not left my mind. It’s very discouraging. After all the “progress” that has been made in working to change the social norms that support violence and the attitudes that allow rape and other sexual violence to persist, clearly we are not there yet! What is wrong with this picture that in a suburban high school in Ohio, not only was a young girl repeatedly raped and assaulted, then videotaped but many students participated and/or witnessed the assault, did nothing, laughed and sent the images virally around the world.

Boys being boys? Bystanders in denial? Witnesses caught like deer in the headlights? Unconscious accomplices? Immaturity combined with entitlement? Of course it reminds me of the Jerry Sandusky case at Penn State where the assistant coach saw “something” in the locker room between Sandusky and a youth and although disturbed by what he saw, he wasn’t sure and he didn’t know what to do and so did nothing to intervene.

So here we are in April, which is Sexual Assault Awareness Month and also Child Abuse Prevention Month. Yesterday, Wednesday, April 24^th was the 14^th annual Denim Day USA, is a sexual violence prevention education campaign dedicated to supporting survivors of all ages, genders, races, ethnicities and nationalities, and preventing rape. Each year we promote wearing jeans with a purpose and invite youth to participate in educational opportunities to debunk the myths that continue to persist. Clearly, there is so much more education to do. We need more bystander education that aims to engage everyone to become aware and alert and to care about this issue for their own well-being and for the well-being of others. There is something to say for “doing the right thing” kind of education. Are there enough courses in schools teaching how important it is to do the right thing and if you are not sure — to find out?

Organizations like Peace Over Violence and 1in6 work on the issue of sexual abuse everyday, not just on Denim Day. Every month is sexual abuse awareness and prevention month for the network of an agencies that provides intervention services, prevention and policy toward the vision of a culture that doesn’t ignore, allow, excuse or condone sexual violence in any form.

Our efforts must persist but we also have to rethink, reframe and perhaps reinvent how we do what we do to have greater impact. We have to find more ways to engage individuals—especially young people, communities, families and all of our institutions in this effort. We have a long way to go. I personally refuse to give up or to abandon this vision. It’s time to organize and engage with one another so that our very culture says NO MORE to sexual violence, domestic abuse and child abuse.

I believe we can get there. Will you believe too?

- By Patti Giggans

Patti Giggans is the Executive Director of Peace Over Violence. Peace Over Violence is dedicated to building healthy relationships, families and communities free from sexual, domestic and interpersonal violence. She is also the Vice-President of the Board of Directors for 1in6.

The mission of 1in6 is to help men who have had unwanted or abusive sexual experiences in childhood live healthier, happier lives.

1in6′s mission also includes serving family members, friends and partners by providing information and support resources on the web and in the community.

Joyful Heart and 1in6 invite you to visit 1in6.org for info, options and hope, and to learn more about our partnership and Engaging Men initiative at men.joyfulheartfoundation.org.

The views expressed above are not necessarily those of the Joyful Heart Foundation or 1in6.